Description

An enjoyable route that combines classic Greyrock slab and thin-crack climbing with a bit of liebacking and steeper face action, Jetstream Deluxe is a reasonable step up from the 5.8s in the area.

P1: Climb a short face into a shallow, right-facing corner with a diminutive pine tree in it. After the corner turns into a slightly steeper seam, traverse left (5.9) on face and thin-crack moves into a fingercrack. Climb this crack and trend right, linking discontinuous seams to one of two belay options - a small ledge with good pro, or, about 25 feet higher, a large ledge with a couple bushes and a large, steep corner on its right side. 5.9, 175+ feet.

P2: On the right side of the large ledge, lieback and undercling a right-arching flake (good pro) until you're able to stem the dihedral (5.8/9-). Gain a stance on a ledge at the base of a blank, dark scoop. The scoop presents an awesome-looking, but totally unprotected and probably hard, friction stemming problem - instead, take a couple steps backward on the ledge until you're able to step right around the arete to well-featured, though runout, face climbing (5.7R). Move up, trending left into a corner, passing a small overlap and gaining a nice belay spot near a pine tree at the base of a huge, left-facing dihedral. A really fun pitch. 5.9- (7R), 130 feet.

P3: Head straight up off the belay, climbing the face and large dihedral through easy terrain (5.4/5.5). Pass a large chockstone at the top of the corner, placing pro at your head to prevent heinous rope drag over the 'stone. Scramble up the slab, heading right through easy 5th/4th class terrain to the top, or aim straight up to pass a small bulge on good handjams and fingerlocks (5.6, fun). Either way, run out the rope to a good belay and scramble to the summit. 5.6, 200+ feet.

Location

About 70 feet left of The Greatest Route at Greyrock is a large, left-facing dihedral that rises off a grassy ledge. Jetstream climbs a brief right-facing corner equipped with a small pine tree about 10 feet left of the dihedral.

Protection

A standard rack up to #2 Camalot/#3 Friend is sufficient for this route. Go heavy on the small stuff (Micronuts, offsets, tiny cams) for P1. A couple long slings would come in handy on this route, particularly for pro placed at the top of the P2 dihedral.

While this route does include about 25 feet of unprotected face climbing, I gave it a "PG-13," rather than R, as the runout occurs on mostly positive holds on terrain far easier than the route's cruxes. The protection on the route's P1 crux can be tricky at times, but the rock is clean and good placements can be had with proper attention to detail and a diverse set of small pro. The 5.9 isn't at all stiff, and the grade seems to take into account the "spice" of the route in addition to the technical difficulties - none of the moves felt much harder than 9- on my ascent. The rock is clean and solid, and the climbing quite fun. Check it out!

Another great moderate route. On the second pitch crux, I climbed up to the smooth looking corner to check it out (said hell no!) and slung the horn on that big block, down climbed a few feet and moved left out on the clean face (maybe sporty 10b?) to the obvious jugs on the face, which lead up and over to easier ground above. I'm not sure if this was the standard path, or if moving right to avoid the smooth corner thingy is standard. Either way, excellent pitch and fun route.

I think I may have done the first ascent of this route in 1974 when Ed Eggers and I went up there with with my brand new rack (6 carabiners, 3 nuts and some slings), rope and Peter Limmer hiking boots. I didn't know too much about leading other than you needed gear at each belay and something in the middle, thus, three nuts. We walked around the base and found a crack that went up, and started climbing it. I ended up at the ledge with some junipers, below the smooth dihedral (I describe is looking up from inside a bathtub). I found a crack for one of my nuts and anchored in. It was spring and there was a bit of snow on the junipers so, when I started climbing up the "bathtub", stemming in my Limmers, it was pretty slippery. I'd stem up a ways then slide down and land on the bouncy junipers, then I'd do it again and get a little further, each time sliding back down the dihedral to bounce gently on the snowy junipers. When I finally made it out of the dihedral after probably 6 "slides" onto the junipers, I found myself on the long but easy slab. I climbed a ways up, found a slot or something for my nut, then climbed up to the next ledge and finished the route.

I don't recall too much about the route other than the vivid memories of the bathtub and the slab. The route description for Jetstream Deluxe describes the smooth dihedral almost exactly as I recall it so I'm pretty sure this was the route we climbed.

BTW, Ed had never climbed before (I taught him the hip belay at the base of the route) and I had never led a pitch before so neither of us had any idea that what we were doing was really, really stupid.